September 4, 2018 — The fishing industry says the U.S. government is crushing them with regulations.
Waters off New England in midst of record year for warmth
August 31, 2018 — The waters off of New England are already warming faster than most of the world’s oceans, and they are nearing the end of one of the hottest summers in their history.
That is the takeaway from an analysis of summer sea surface temperatures in the Gulf of Maine by a marine scientist with the Gulf of Maine Research Institute in Portland. The average sea surface temperature in the gulf was nearly 5 degrees Fahrenheit above the long-term average during one 10-day stretch in August, said the scientist, Andy Pershing, who released the work Thursday.
Aug. 8 was the second warmest day in recorded history in the gulf, and there were other sustained stretches this summer that were a few degrees higher than the average from 1982 to 2011, Pershing said. He characterized this year as “especially warm” even for a body of water that he and other scientists previously identified as warming faster than 99 percent of the global ocean.
MASSACHUSETTS: GOP hopeful Geoff Diehl forms fishing advisory council
August 31, 2018 — Geoff Diehl, who’s running in the Republican primary for U.S. Senate, announced Thursday morning the formation of his “Fishing Advisory Council.”
Diehl made the announcement on the city’s working waterfront at Bergie’s Seafood.
“Understanding the importance of fishing to our economy, I have been meeting with leaders of the industry for well over a year. It is clear that fishermen need and deserve a full-time senator who will work to revive and protect the industry,” Diehl said in a statement. “That’s why today I am pleased to announce my Fishing Advisory Council. They will be advising me on fishing and related matters that effect our local ports.”
Members include:
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- Bill Mantville, Leading Seafoods, Boston
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- John Haran, Sector 13, New Bedford
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- John Reardon, Sector 9, New Bedford
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- Mark Bergeron, Bergie’s Seafoods, New Bedford
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- Mike Orlando, Intershell International, Gloucester
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- Rob Rizzo, Eastern Fisheries, New Bedford
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- Patrick Hughes, Harbor Blue Fisheries, Fairhaven
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- Captain Dave Marciano, FV Hard Merchandise, Gloucester
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- Chris Basile, Quaterdeck Seafood, Maynard
Another Whale Carcass Spotted in Massachusetts Has Scientists Alarmed for Population
August 30, 2018 — The second right whale death of 2018 has been recorded near Martha’s Vineyard.
North Atlantic right whales are one of the most endangered marine mammals with an estimated population of 450.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the young whale was first reported floating off Tom’s Neck Point, Martha’s Vineyard, on Sunday. The carcass of the 30-foot whale again was spotted Monday and the agency began planning to tow it to shore to perform a necropsy.
On Tuesday, however, the U.S. Coast Guard and two staff members of the NOAA Fisheries Woods Hole Laboratory sailed to the carcass and determined it was too decomposed to bring to shore. The crew attached a satellite tag and took tissue samples. If the whale carcass does make it to land, they will collect more samples.
MASSACHUSETTS: Senate hopeful Lindstrom visits the New Bedford fishing industry
August 30, 2018 — The New Bedford fishing industry rolled out the red carpet Wednesday for Beth Lindstrom, one of three Republicans locked in a primary battle to see who will go up against incumbent Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren.
Lindstrom’s first visit to the fishing industry was arranged by Saving Seafood, a Washington, D.C.-based industry advocacy group founded by New Bedford native Bob Vanasse.
The half-day-long visit began at the BASE seafood auction on Hassey Street, owned and operated by Richard Canastra. There, buyers and the general public can watch as fish are auctioned off electronically, a far cry from the old system of chalk on a blackboard.
Lindstrom, former executive director of the Massachusetts State Lottery, mainly asked questions and listened to fishing industry representatives who told her of the difficulties they have with federal regulations.
An added concern, they said, is the pending construction of huge offshore wind energy farms that they say will keep fishing boats at bay to avoid the risk of entanglement.
The case of Carlos Rafael, known as The Codfather, was also brought up because of the hardship that the government imposed on fishing boats in sectors 7 and 9 and on-shore services who weren’t involved in Rafael’s misdeeds. Rafael is serving a 46-month federal sentence on charges including conspiracy, false labeling of fish, bulk cash smuggling, tax evasion and falsifying federal records.
JON MITCHELL: New York Wind Farms Could Harm Fishing Industry
August 30, 2018 — The city is continuing progress in developing the offshore wind industry without adversely affecting the commercial fishing industry. Mayor Jon Mitchell says we’ll see more activity in the area within the coming months.
However, in his weekly appearance on WBSM, the mayor voiced his concerns with proposed offshore wind farms that are proposed in the waters off New York and New Jersey
Mayor Mitchell said that those waters are much more heavily fished by New Bedford-based vessels than the wind farm areas off Massachusetts. He said that if those proposed wind developments become a reality, it will have a very adverse effect on the local fishing industry.
How Whale Poop Could Counter Calls to Resume Commercial Hunting
August 29, 2018 — Before whales dive into the darkness of the deep ocean they often come to the surface and release a huge plume of fecal matter—which can be the color of over-steeped green tea or a bright orange sunset. When Joe Roman, a conservation biologist at the University of Vermont, saw one of these spectacular dumps in the mid-1990s, he got to wondering: “Is it ecologically important? Or is it a fart in a hurricane?”
Roman and other researchers have since shown whale excrement provides key nutrients that fuel the marine food chain, and that it also contributes to the ocean carbon cycle. These important roles are now influencing scientific and economic arguments for protecting whales, at a time when calls for a resumption of whaling are growing. “The scientific community is coming to understand a new value of whales: their role in maintaining healthy and productive oceans,” says Sue Fisher, a marine wildlife consultant at the nonprofit Animal Welfare Institute. “We are beginning to see governments use this rationale to justify measures to protect whales.” But as the International Whaling Commission (IWC) prepares for its biennial meeting next month, the ecological services whales provide are set to split the gathered countries—with an unknown outcome for the whales.
Whale poop’s importance is nothing to sniff at. In a 2010 study Roman’s team found whale defecation brings 23,000 metric tons of nitrogen to the surface each year in the Gulf of Maine—more than all the rivers that empty into the gulf combined. This nitrogen fertilizes the sea by sustaining microscopic plants that feed animal plankton, which in turn feeds fish and other animals including the whales themselves. Studies have found similar effects elsewhere, and with other nutrients found in whale feces. And when they migrate, whales also redistribute nutrients around the globe. By moving them from higher latitudes, Roman says, the giant mammals could be increasing productivity in some tropical waters by 15 percent.
By stimulating the growth of microscopic plants called phytoplankton, whale scat may also help limit climate change. These tiny aquatic plants remove carbon from the atmosphere and carry it deep into the ocean when they die. Research in the Southern Ocean showed the iron defecated each year by some 12,000 resident sperm whales feeds phytoplankton that store 240,000 more metric tons of carbon in the deep ocean than the whales exhale. This means that, on balance, whales help lock carbon away.
Read the full story at the Scientific American
A controversial comeback for a highly prized tuna
August 29, 2018 — SOUTH PORTLAND, Maine — On a drizzling summer afternoon in South Portland, marine biologist Walt Golet is helping attach a quarter-ton Atlantic bluefin tuna to a heavy crane so it can be weighed as part of New England’s premier tournament for the giant fish. And this year’s derby is different than many in the past — there are far more tuna.
A decade ago, participants in the Sturdivant Island Tuna Tournament went consecutive years in which they didn’t catch a single fish in the Gulf of Maine. This year, fishermen set a record with 30, including the 801-pound (363.33-kilogram) winner.
Their record haul is happening amid a turning point for these giant tuna, an iconic species that scientists say appears to be slowly recovering in the Atlantic Ocean. The reemergence of bluefin, which can weigh more than half a ton, has led to debate among fishermen, conservationists and scientists over just how much the big fish have recovered. It remains at a fraction of its population 60 years ago.
“There’s probably no fish that’s ever been more politicized than Atlantic bluefin tuna,” said Golet, a University of Maine professor. “People get a passion for this fish. And people are making a living off of this fish.”
The fish have long been at the center of a battle among commercial fishermen who can make a huge amount of money on a single fish, environmentalists who see them as marvels of marine migration, and consumers who pay a hefty price for them in restaurants.
Read the full story from the Associated Press at The Washington Post
In Their Own Words: ‘Dead In The Water’ Lets Fishermen Tell Their Story
August 29, 2018 — What convinced Angela Sanfilippo, president of the Gloucester Fishermen’s Wives Association, that filmmaker David Wittkower could tell the story of the decline of the New England commercial fishing industry was that he wanted to interview fishermen and let them speak in their own voice.
“That never happened,” she said. In most stories in the media about the industry, fishermen’s words “are always twisted,” she said. But she sensed that wouldn’t happen with Wittkower, that he’d let fishermen tell their own stories.
“This documentary tells the story of what people have endured through the years, and what we’re still enduring,” said Sanfilippo, whose organization helped finance “Dead in the Water,” Wittkower’s documentary on the industry, which screens at the Chatham Orpheum Theater on Saturday, Sept. 8 at 10 a.m.
Wittkower, who lives in Los Angeles but spent his middle and high school years in Rockport, where his parents still live, said he became interested in the plight of the commercial fishing industry about four years ago when he noticed fewer and fewer fishing boats docked in Gloucester. He began talking to folks and eventually made his way to Sanfilippo, who gave him the lowdown about how catch limits, days at sea restrictions and other regulations were killing the industry and making it impossible for young people to take up fishing.
Read the full story at The Cape Cod Chronicle
New Study Seeks To Reveal The Secrets Of Halibut
August 29, 2018 — Fred Bennett has been a fisherman for about 60 years and he just stared, perplexed, at a graph supposedly showing a halibut, tagged to track its progress, moving in the water column.
He shook his head in consternation and looked at fellow captain Mike Anderson who has spent more than 40 years on the water.
How is that possible? Bennett wondered.
Anderson was laughing.
It’s not, he said – unless the storied flat fish had been eaten by something, most likely a great white shark.
“The tag was hanging out near the bottom during the day and was near the surface of the water during the night time, plus the tag temperature shot up suddenly and stayed there – pretty clear indications that it was eaten by a shark,” agreed George Maynard, research coordinator at the Cape Cod Commercial Fishermen’s Alliance.
Stumping Bennett and Anderson would be tough. The two spent many years catching halibut, a great-tasting fish that is making fishermen money in Canada, and used to make fishermen money here. But stocks crashed, and for the last 18 years local fishermen have been allowed to land only one fish per trip, and that one has to measure at least 41 inches.
Read the full story at The Cape Cod Chronicle
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